The Other Road
by Tenshi Aine
Summary: What if Dean never chose the easy road to Hell, choosing instead to live and hunt alone? What if he got too reckless for his own safety and had to give up hunting anyway? What place is there for Dean in the normal world? MuteDean in College. SUSPENDED


Prologue:

**Design Loft,**

**Stanford University, Palo Alto**

**June 02, 2009**

"_Hey Williams, man!"_

_He straightened up and turned, taking off his mechanic gloves and safety glasses, and laying them neatly on his work table before facing the source of the call. It was his roomate, Ethan, and he knew what the kid would say next. He gave him a neutral smile in greeting. Here it comes. _

"_You planning on starving for that project of yours or what? 'Cause that Diner girl is totally taken with you and you've got to be the most oblivious genius I've ever met. She's totally hot, man, and she's got eyes only for you. You got to ask her out sometime. Get her number. Make a move or something. She already knows that you can't talk, so that problem's covered. Seriously, what else can you ask for? You gotta _live_ more, Dean!"_

_He shook his head as he walked beside Ethan out of the Design Loft and into the Stanford's sunshine lit hallways. His footsteps, and his presence, oddly silent beside Ethan's gawky movements and rapid speech. He didn't know why he put with the guy, except he always did. He looked sideways at his still talking roomate and colleague, taking in the floppy, reddish brown hair, and dimpled grin. He glanced away, discomfited. Perhaps, he corrected himself, he did know part of why he put up with the kid. But, he thought, it didn't really matter. Nothing really mattered much anymore, except he had promises to keep. _

* * *

**Cold Oak, South Dakota,**

**May 17, 2007**

Sam's body was laid out on a faded old mattress that Bobby had found somewhere in the house. Dean gazed at the still form, his mind blank. Except for the burn of the alcohol in his gut, he was cold all over.

"Dad didn't even have to tell me, you know."

This was wrong. It was all so wrong. He was alive. He could feel the steady blood pumping through him, as strong as ever. He could feel his clothes on his skin, the muscles and bones in his hands twisting and working, the burning behind his eyes. It was wrong to be so alive when the form lying before him, when _Sammy_, was so motionless. Not even the subtle movement of breathing stirred the air around his body, while Dean sat there, apologizing uselessly.

". . . It's like I had one job, one job," he continued, " and I screwed it up. I blew it, and for that I'm sorry." He paused to compose himself, as grief clawed its way through his throat and bitter failure rose up to consume him. "I guess it's just what I do," he smiled briefly, as though he was sharing a joke only him and the dead were privy to. _Pathetic_, a part of him whispered. "I let down the people I love. Hell, I let Dad down. . ."

_Don't say that. . ._

"And now, I guess, I'm just supposed to let you down too."

_No. It's not. . ._

"How can I. . .How am I supposed to live with that?" He whispered to the cold corpse, pleading. Pleading for what, he didn't know; perhaps for an answer. Perhaps for someone-- _Dad_-- to tell him what to do, or for Sammy to understand.

_Please just. . ._

"What am I supposed to do, Sammy?" Grief was consuming him now, grief and guilt and rage and failure, and he couldn't stop them, couldn't stop it, couldn't stop anything. Useless! "What am I supposed to do! "

_Listen!_

Dean stilled completely when he noticed his breaths blowing out in a fog. For what seemed like an eternity, there was nothing except the sudden drop in temperature, then it came. A rush of freezing air snaked its way past him, circled Sam's cold body with a thin whistling cry, and was gone.

"Sam?" Dean's voice was a scratch in the stillness, "Sammy? Was that you?"

Only a dead silence answered him. _Don't do this, Dean. . .  
_

_

* * *

  
_

Dean drove with a single-minded intensity. It was one of those rare moments when Dean channeled John and Sam in iron determination. The spirit sitting shotgun saw the expression and willed, prayed, begged his brother to _stop this_, to not go down that road. He knew where Dean was going. He knew what Dean wanted to do, and he couldn't let that happen. He would find a way to make Dean listen, or he would find a way to kill that crossroads bitch, or stop the car, or something, anything!

Dean's nerves jumped as the radio came to life with a blast of music,_"Carry on my wayward son!"_ His forearms and hands spasmed on the steering wheel, causing the Impala to lurch a little, from side to side. "_There'll be peace when you are done. Lay your weary head to rest."_ Suddenly, Dean couldn't breath around the lump in his throat as he looked at the radio that he hadn't touched at all. It was still singing: _"Don't you cry no more."_

"That's," he choked out, even as he realized his cheeks were wet and discreetly swiped it off his face, "That's just too cheesy. . . Sammy." He gave a gasp of a laugh as he parked the car to the side of the road and cut the engines off, waiting.

The radio went quiet, and for one horrible moment, Dean thought he must have imagined the whole thing, until the radio came on time it was a radio drama:_"Don't do this to yourself, Leah! It's not your fault! He wouldn't want you to. . . Roxanne! You don't have to sell your. . . "_

"Sammy, I. . ." Dean started to say, but stopped because there was really nothing he could say anymore except for: "You've been listening in on me, bitch!" Then, knowing Sam so well, Dean could almost hear the pointededly exasperated reply, _You _were_ talking to me Dean._

The radio was now switching channels rapidly enough that Dean couldn't make out any words until it settled on the voice of a sports commentator: _". . .going to live with that inj. . ." _The word was cut off as the channel started switching again, _". . .ay for yourself. . .uo happy. . . has not been found yet bu. . . college students prote. . ." _

"You realize," said Dean, not bothering to wipe his face now, "that you're talking like Herbie, Sam?"


End file.
